The Dragon Factory (70 page)

“Why not?”

“They should put him on display. In a zoo. In a freak show.”

“Will public humiliation redress the harm he’s done?”

“I don’t know. Go ask a philosopher.”

“I’m asking you.”

I didn’t answer. What could I say?

He stood up. “We’ll talk later.”

“No,” I said. “I’m done. I quit. I can’t do this anymore.”

He adjusted his tie. “We’ll talk later.”

When he left I saw that he’d put a pack of cookies on my nightstand. Oreos.

Rudy had been silent through all of this. He said, “Do you really want to quit?”

“I . . . have to,” I said. “I’m ruined.”

“Your injuries are bad, Joe, but they said you’d make a complete recovery.”

I looked away. “I’m ruined.”

(6)

On a beautiful morning in mid-September they wheeled me out of the hospital. Rudy was there with a car to take me to the airport. There was
no sign of Mr. Church or anyone else from the DMS. Rudy was silent for most of the drive, then, “How are you doing, Cowboy?”

I shook my head.

“The war’s over,” he said. “The soldiers have come home from the battlefield. It’s time to talk.”

It took a long time for me to pick the right words. “Why do we do it, Rude?”

“Why do we fight? We fight because someone has to—”

“No,” I said. “Why do we hate?”

“I don’t know. There are long and short answers to that. Mostly people hate because people are different from them, or because they’re the same. It comes down to fear. Our species has always been motivated by fear. We fear what we don’t know or understand, we fear differences, and the primitive in our consciousness demonstrates fear through violence. It’s what makes us so aggressive. Fear, and greed.”

“Is that all? Is that everything that is necessary to explain monsters like Otto Wirths and Cyrus Jakoby?” Despite everything, I still thought of him by that name. As Jakoby he was a worse monster than he’d been as Mengele. “Those men loved what they were doing. They delighted in it. It wasn’t fear of other races . . . it was hatred.”

“It was evil, Joe. And there is no real definition of what evil is. The best we can do is try and recognize it when we see it, and then try to stop it.”

“That isn’t good enough, Rude.”

“I know,” he said.

(7)

While the records recovered from the Dragon Factory were being mined a clear link was made between the Jakobys and the Sunderland family. Harold Sunderland was arrested by police as he stepped off a plane in São Paolo. In light of his connection with the attempted mass genocide, there was no hesitation about extradition.

When FBI agents showed up at the office of J. P. Sunderland to serve a federal warrant, the senator suffered a massive coronary. He was pronounced dead on arrival at Georgetown University Hospital. A clear link was discovered between Sunderland and former deputy information analyst Stephen Preston, the man who had given the false information on which the Vice President acted. However, an exhaustive search of Sunderland’s paper and computer records could establish nothing that implicated the Vice President in any wrongdoing.

Vice President Bill Collins dodged the bullet, and nothing about his attempted dismantling of the DMS ever made it to the press. However, CNN was the first to observe that Collins and the President seemed cooler to each other than during their campaign, and Jon Stewart made some jokes about Collins being even more “off the public radar” than Dick Cheney had been.

The Vice President spent a lot of time out of Washington.

On one of his flights to his home state, the Vice President was alone aboard a small military jet. He put in his earbuds, turned on his iPod, and settled back to enjoy the trip. Twenty minutes into the flight someone reached over and turned off the iPod.

The VP woke up and started to demand what the hell was going on. But he never finished the sentence. A man sat across from him. Early sixties, tall and blocky, wearing tinted sunglasses. A slim briefcase lay on the seat next to him.

“What the hell are
you
doing here?”

Mr. Church opened his briefcase and removed a small pack of Nilla wafers. He selected a cookie and set the pack aside. He did not offer one to the Vice President.

“You’d better have a good goddamned explanation for—”

Church said, “Sunderland.”

“Bullshit,” Collins sneered. “I stand by my—”

“Shhhh,” Mr. Church said, placing a finger to his lips. “It would be better for you to listen.”

The curtain to the forward cabin opened and Linden Brierly leaned
against the door frame. The newly appointed Director of the Secret service smiled thinly, but his eyes were as cold as ice.

“Mr. Vice President,” said Church, “we are going to have a long talk about your future in politics and your general health.”

(8)

Weeks later, when I could walk without crutches, I drove to the Warehouse to pack my stuff. Rudy had been taking care of my cat, but I had clothes and a lot of personal belongings in my quarters. I wanted to take it home, to close that chapter of my life.

The guards at the gate waved me through and saluted as I passed. Bunny met me at the staff door, but he could tell I wasn’t in the mood to talk, so he just held the door open for me.

I walked through the corridors of the Warehouse, past the labs where Hu and Bug worked. Past Jerry Spencer’s forensics lab. Past the office Church used when he was there. Past the conference room and firing range.

Rudy’s door was closed and I didn’t know if he’d already packed his things. We hadn’t talked about whether he was staying on or not.

I found my room and opened it with my key and lingered in the doorway.

I hadn’t been there since the morning after the last time Grace and I made love. Someone had straightened the bed, changed the sheets. Replaced the damaged lamp.

Inside I found two things. Against the wall was a stack of empty boxes along with packing tape and labels. Everything I would need to remove all traces of myself from this place. I was done with hunting evil. I was ruined, worn out, damaged beyond fixing. Rudy disagreed, but I was the one who could look inside and see only wreckage and no clear path left to take.

The second item was on the bed. A file folder.

I opened it. Inside was a surveillance photo of a tall man with an
austere face. Behind him was a sign advertising a tour of the Riviera dei Fiori. The River of Flowers. A tourist spot on the Italian Riviera. Someone had used a Sharpie to draw a black circle around the man’s face. Next to it was written: “Two days ago.”

I lifted the picture. Beneath it in the folder were my passport, plane tickets, a credit card with my name on it, and other useful documents.

The man in the picture was Conrad Veder.

I sat down on the edge of the bed. I held the photo in both hands and stared into the face of the man who had murdered Grace Courtland. Then I looked at the stack of empty boxes.

Church had left the decision up to me, though he’d given me everything I needed no matter which path I chose.